Resistance by Japanese Canadians in the Second World War and beyond

Myth Busting

During times of difficulty and oppression, historical acts of resistance can take many forms: An Indigenous girl started a riot at a residential school in Alberta to protest the terrible food; Jewish people in Nazi concentration camps secretly practiced their religion and cultural traditions; Black people enslaved by white North Americans quietly resisted by working slowly and breaking equipment.

When looking at systemic racism and injustices, the people who are marginalized and treated poorly are often portrayed as helpless victims who just followed along without questioning or resisting what happened.

In the years following the forced uprooting, incarceration, dispossession and exile of Japanese Canadians, this myth was formed and validated by any number of books, videos, articles, and documentaries. Let’s examine this myth more closely.

• Review the information provided which contradicts the commonly held view that Japanese Canadians did not resist and complied with their incarceration and exile.
• Debunk the myth with your class using the guiding questions and information provided below.

Myth: Japanese Canadians were passive quiet victims who offered no resistance.

There was resistance by Japanese Canadians and in many ways. But we often do not hear or know these stories. This is because the dominant culture, the ones responsible for these injustices, have been the ones providing the narrative for generations. In some cases, the depth of these injustices have been left out of school history books. There are North Americans who went through school, including post-secondary education, and never learned anything about how their governments incarcerated Japanese Canadians and Japanese Americans during the Second World War.

This is because the voices and perspectives of marginalized people have not traditionally been valued. Their stories and experiences have not been asked for, recorded, heard, shared, saved, and repeated for generations as those of the dominant culture have been. There is a negative stereotype of Japanese Canadians (and Asians, in general) as passive subservient people. With regard to the Canadian government’s systemic incarceration of Japanese Canadians during the Second World War, there is this myth that Japanese Canadians were compliant and submissive because they did as they were told without any resistance. In addition, there was a racist undertone where Japanese Canadians were seen as “less than” human or deserving of equal treatment when compared to white people. In some instances, they were shamed and blamed for allowing these injustices to happen to them.

To debunk these myths, let us first consider what Japanese Canadians were up against.

Discussion: What would en masse resistance have looked like?

What would it have meant for Japanese Canadians to have formed a resistance movement? What might have happened if they resisted incarceration with physical force? What does it mean to resist en masse when facing systemic racism?

Japanese Canadians currently make up about 0.35 percent of the population in Canada. In the 1940s this percentage was even lower. Did they have the physical numbers to influence or enact change? What would they be able to achieve? Where would they go? Who would support them in Canada?

Note: The Canadian government forced about 23,000 Japanese Canadians from their homes and more than 75 percent of them were born in Canada or were naturalized citizens. The overwhelming majority of these people saw Canada as their home, not Japan. Many had never even been to Japan before. (Source: Canadian Museum for Human Rights).

What forces would Japanese Canadians be fighting against? Have the students brainstorm ideas. If you want to make some ties into English class, you can ask students think about what “person versus person” and “person versus society” conflicts did Japanese Canadians face. The government—the Canadian government created hundreds of enactments that impacted the freedoms of Japanese Canadians. The government made incarcerating Japanese Canadians legal and mandatory. Those who resisted were put in jail. How would Japanese Canadians support or protect their family if they were in jail? In 1942, then Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King privately said, “no matter how honourable they might appear to be, or how long they may have been away from Japan, naturalized, or even those who were born in [Canada]. Everyone of them . . . would be saboteurs and would help Japan when the moment came.” (Source: OpenText BC: Japanese Canadians in the Second World War)

If this is how the leader of your country sees you because of your race, how much power will you have to fight back against the government?

• The police—could Japanese Canadians go to the police and file a complaint against the government? No. The police were directed to round up Japanese Canadians and patrol the sites of incarceration, and enforce the racist laws enacted by the government.
• Canadian society—anti-Asian sentiment existed amongst the white population of Canada long before the war due to the growing Asian population. These communities were referred to as a “yellow peril” and claimed Asians were dominating certain industries and encroaching on other Canadians. Once the war started, these fears continued to grow but focused on Japanese Canadians.

This newspaper clipping from the Vancouver Sun on January 2, 1942 is an excerpt by George J. Felton for the letter to the editor section .

If this was considered an acceptable opinion to publish in a newspaper, imagine what people were saying in everyday life about Japanese Canadians. What power did Japanese Canadians have to change such overwhelming racist views?

• Neighbours—many neighbours looted and/or bought the homes, property, household goods, etc. of Japanese Canadians who were incarcerated. Share this news clipping to show how white Canadians responded to Japanese being forcibly removed from their homes and having their property sold off.

Tom Matsui grew up in Vancouver and his family owned a bicycle shop. He talks about the racism that he, as other Asian Canadians, experienced in Canada. “I was first exposed to discrimination when we had the store. And every Halloween, the so-called Georgia Street Gang, a white gang, would come down Main Street, and they’d pass through Chinatown, doing vandalism. And my older brothers were always ready to protect the store. They would turn off all the lights. Lock the place up, and they’d be armed with baseball bats that’d protect the place. And the younger ones, they made sure that we were upstairs. So, from very early, I knew that, that we had discrimination. So, when Pearl Harbour started, I knew that we were in trouble.”

Matsui, August 11, 2015. Source: Read, H. (2016) The Legacy of a Hidden Camera: Acts of Making in Japanese Canadian Internment Camps During the Second World War, as depicted on Tom Matsui’s Photograph Collection. Material Culture Review, 84, 26-48 and  The Ward Museum: Political and Communal Attitudes Toward Japanese Canadians

During the Second World War, Allied forces were fighting Japan and thus from a global stage, Japanese Canadians did not have any countries or government bodies to ask for help regarding the injustices they faced. When there are unjust government laws in place, police forces enforcing them, and these actions accepted by the majority of the population—where can you turn to for support? If Japanese Canadians resisted by refusing to go or used any kind of force in resisting, they would be jailed and even put themselves at risk of being injured or killed if they took up arms to prevent themselves from being taken away. Do you think there were any real options for mass resistance to be in any way successful?

Written reflection:

Have students write a reflection or journal entry about the difficulties faced by Japanese Canadians in the face of such pervasive and systematic racism. Have students think about what they would have done to resist, even if it was a small action. What could they have done to help Japanese Canadians during that time as non-Japanese Canadians?

Important note

Myth: Most people held racist ideas during this time period so what happened to Japanese Canadians was just the way it was back then.

Just because the majority don’t speak out or see a problem with an unjust or racist act, does not make it acceptable or less wrong. There were non-Japanese Canadians who did speak up against this injustice, even though they were the minority.

Japanese Canadians experienced firsthand terrible treated by the Canadian government, RCMP, the news media, and society in general. Japanese Canadians who lived through this were upset and traumatized from being incarcerated and losing everything they owned. They clearly knew what happened to them was wrong. One way that teachers can help dispel myths is by learning about and sharing stories of Japanese Canadian resistance.

Note to teacher

Several activities follow this introduction to the resistance of Japanese Canadians. Teachers are not required to do every discussion or activity in this lesson set. The activities were created to provide you with options; pick and choose the ones that work best for you. You can go through this material as a class and/or you can have students focus and research a different form of resistance on their own and then have them come back and share the learning with their class as a whole. You can break students up into groups to create a poster/presentation to share with the class on the specific resistance topic they researched. Another option is for students to research a Japanese Canadian resistry to create a biography poster/presentation to share with the class.

Some Japanese Canadian men formed groups to protest and resist the mass incarceration of Japanese Canadians. For example, there was an issei group called “Ganbari-gumi,” and the Nisei Mass Evacuation Group who refused orders to go to the immigration building. The Nisei Mass Evacuation Group had people sign petitions and made public speeches demanding families be able to stay together. Some Japanese Canadians went into hiding while at the opposite end of the spectrum, some protested by surrendering themselves and asked to be imprisoned as enemy aliens. 

About 700 Japanese Canadian men refused to be incarcerated and/or leave their homes and families — and as a result the Canadian government sent them to prisoner-of-war camps in Ontario.

Mits Sumiya was an engineering student at the University of British Columbia when the Canadian government started incarcerating Japanese Canadians. He was one of 76 Japanese Canadian students who were banished from the university. Sumiya spent four years in a prisoner-of-war camp. Hear him talk about how he became a prisoner of war in Canada. (Sources: The Canadian Encyclopedia.ca, Online Exhibition | Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre , and Mits Sumiya – Discover Nikkei)

Discussion/Writing Reflection:

Discuss with students if they think they would have spoken up against the mass incarceration of Japanese Canadians if they were Japanese Canadian, knowing they would be separated from their family and sent to a prison in Ontario. Would speaking up for what is right be worth the consequences?

Activity:

You can break students up into pairs and have them imagine they are two family members debating whether they should speak out against the mass incarceration of Japanese Canadians or just go along with being sent to pick sugar beets in Alberta so the family can stay together. Have one person support the idea of speaking out against this injustice and resisting incarceration and the other person will be supporting the idea of just doing as the Canadian government says.

Japanese Canadian men were forced to work on road crews and as labourers on farms. The Canadian government made them work to pay for their own incarceration. Japanese Canadians could passively resist the forced labour by doing something as simple as slowing down the rate of their work and/or doing the job with limited effort. In some cases, they refused to work. For example, when Takeo Nakano was incarcerated during the Second World War, he was forced to work as part of a road crew in Slocan. He was separated from his wife and children, after being promised they would be able to stay together. Nakano protested this situation by refusing to work, and as a result, he was sent to the prisoner-of-war camp in Ontario. He wrote a book about his experience called Within the Barbed Wire Fence. For more details check out “Japanese Canadians and Internment: The Role of The New Canadian as an Agent of Resistance 1941-1945”.

Discussion/Written Reflection:

Did Japanese Canadians have much power to institute change? Even though they did not have a great deal of power in a racist society, as individuals they could make choices to protest how they were treated. Think about what your values are. What would you speak up for or set a boundary in your life—even if the consequences were severe?

Japanese Canadians Take Federal Government to Court

Japanese Canadians hired lawyers to sue the government for the sale of their land and property without their consent. For example, some Japanese Canadians formed a committee in Kaslo to raise money to fight to keep their land from being sold off by the government. “At Kaslo, under the chairmanship of Dr. Kozo Shimotakahara, the “well-known pioneer physician,” the Amalgamated Property Owners’ Association (APOA) began to organize its litigation strategy. Seeking to challenge “the constitutional power of the government even in war time to order liquidation of evacuee-owned property,” the committee called upon all “[r]eal property owners anxious to retain their interest in their homes, land and buildings” to defray the anticipated legal costs of $8,500.” Source: Promises of Law: The Unlawful Dispossession of Japanese Canadians (yorku.ca)

 In May 1944 Eikichi Nakashima, Tadao Wakabayashi, and Jitaro Tanaka appeared with lawyer Arthur MacLennan in federal court to challenge the forced the sale of their property. The legal case dragged on for some time. Justice Thorson released his long-awaited decision on the legality of the forced sale of Japanese Canadian-owned property in August 1947. In Nakashima vs. Canada. Nakashima, Wakabayashi, and Tanaka lose the case, and are ordered to pay the government’s legal costs. Due to past rulings being in favour of the government and the overall racist public opinion of Japanese Canadians, the outcome was not surprising. Still, in the face of oppressively limited odds, Japanese Canadians did not give up; throughout the war, they continued to exercise their legal rights against a systemically racist judicial system.

Discussion/Writing Reflection:

Have a discussion with students about how going to court can be an expensive process that can often take years. Fast change does not happen by going to court. You can also discuss how long it took the Canadian government to apologize for these injustices. Discuss with students about how the judicial system was racist against Japanese Canadians — what was the context that made this possible? Ask students if they think this could happen again or with other marginalized groups in Canada.

Japanese Canadians wrote hundreds of letters to the government to protest the forced sale of their property. Often the letters focused on the low valuations of their property, the lack of consultation or permission, and control regarding the money they received for the sale of their property. The letters expressed anger and frustration but also called on the government to follow British legal practices and honour the spirit of the law.

Lesson:

This activity allows you to take a deep dive with your students or to examine just one letter of protest. The Landscapes of Injustice project based out of the University of Victoria, and the Nikkei National Museum have excellent resources that explore these powerful and evocative letters in depth. There is a timeline that lays out the evolution of the forced sales, and response of Japanese Canadians here. Each package included below contains specific lesson activities designed around the letters protest:

LOI elementary lesson

LOI secondary lesson

Writing Wrongs

Discussion/Written Reflection:

However, if time is tight you may want to have your students examine one letter. The letter presented below (a recreated easy-to-read version) was written by Mrs. Tusurkichi Takemoto in 1946. The letter provides a number of insights into the harsh impact forced sales had on Japanese Canadians.

Activity:

Have your students read the letter in small groups and discuss what was written. What were some of Takemoto’s main ideas? Do you agree with her? You can do an extension on this activity by having students think about an issue they think needs to be addressed by our government or a company and have them write a letter to get their points clearly and persuasively across.

Japanese Canadians wrote diaries, journals and letters to friends and family about their experiences during the Second World War. They expressed their feelings and thoughts about their daily lives. Many of these written accounts are now lost, but some still remain. Some Japanese Canadians used traditional Japanese poetry forms to express themselves, such as haiku. Sukeo “Sam” Sameshima was part of the Tashme Haiku Club during the Second World War. He safeguarded books that have more than 600 haiku written by club members.Here are two that give students a small snapshot of what it was like back then (PDF copies are available here).

Students can access more haiku by going to the following website:

Haiku in Tashme: The legacy of Sukeo “Sam” Sameshima | British Columbia Historical Federation (bchistory.ca)

Activity

Students choose a haiku and then draw and colour in a picture of what that might have looked like. You can then print off the haiku (or have the students write them out), and create a display wall with the haiku and art side by side. Another activity you can do, is to gather each of the poems and all of the completed student artwork. Mix the papers up and then give a random poem and picture to each person (it can be their own work). Then have students walk around and share the poem and picture with others so they can find the matching art to their poem and vice versa.

You can extend this activity by having students write their own haiku to express their thoughts and feelings.

Taking pictures

Photos of life in the camps are not uncommon, but at the time anyone found in possession of a camera or photographs and/or negatives faced the possibility of serious consequences. Japanese Canadians, like Tom Matsui, secretly kept a camera, film, and equipment and took photos during incarceration. Camps did have “official” photographers who were allowed to have and use cameras and photographic equipment. After 1943, the restrictions apparently became lax and adolescents began openly taking snapshots of their friends and social events with Brownie cameras and mailed the film out of the camps to be processed (Ayukawa Citation2000; Katsuno Citation2000).

While restrictions gradually loosened and cameras became more commonplace, it was still a significant risk to own a camera and take pictures.

(Source: The Legacy of a Hidden Camera: Acts of Making in Japanese-Canadian Internment Camps During the Second World War, as Depicted in Tom Matsui’s Photograph Collection (erudit.org)

Discussion/written Reflection:

Imagine you are incarcerated in a purpose-built site in the Kootenay region of British Columbia. You know there is a policy against owning, possessing or using a camera or photographic equipment. What factors would you consider before deciding to break this rule and take photographs of your incarceration? If you had family members to care for, how might this impact your decision?

Violating curfew

The government imposed a curfew so Japanese Canadians could not go out after dark, but people did in order to meet with family and friends or find ways to hide their personal belongings to prevent them from being confiscated by the government. Japanese Canadian Jeanne Ikeda-Douglas was a child at this time, and she and her mother pretended to be Chinese by wearing “I am Chinese” badges, so they could visit her sister at a hospital in Vancouver. It was not uncommon for Chinese Canadians to display signs or notes indicating they were not Japanese. The racist policies imposed against Japanese Canadians put their safety at risk if they violated any of these rules or policies.

Discussion/written Reflection:

Imagine living in a time when as a Chinese Canadian, in order to avoid incarceration, harassment, and possible violence, you needed to wear a badge stating you were Chinese so people would not mistake you for being Japanese. How would you feel? If you were Japanese Canadian, and knew people saw you as the “enemy alien,” how would you feel every time you left your home? Would you risk going out? Would you risk breaking any rules?

When Japanese Canadians left their homes, everything left behind could be looted or sold by the government. After the formal announcement the Office of the Custodian of Enemy Property was to care for the property of Japanese Canadians, some hoped they could return home and collect their property. This announcement coincided with the mass uprooting of Japanese Canadians and their removal from the province.

Jeanne Ikeda-Douglas recalled those days.

Share her account with students:

“… every morning, as the families were forced out of their house and they locked up their doors, I was just appalled that in the morning we wake up, and we’d open the door and look down the street and there was just a line. The full blocks. For blocks on end, were just filled with cars, trucks, and anything that would pull things behind a car. Trailers. And as soon as the family left and we all said goodbye to them, and they locked up, as soon as the people left, all these people would come out. And they would just, they had hammers and axes, and they would just crumble the window or the door glass. And put their hands around (she gestures to indicate door handle) and open up the lock. And then the door. And it was just like a crazy mob would run in and you’d see every stick of furniture, or anything that was left in the house. It was a grand melee of people. They stripped the place clean. I was just amazed. As a child, I couldn’t believe that people could do that.”
(Jeanne Ikeda-Douglas, interview by Heather Read, for Landscapes of Injustice oral history interviews. August 13, 2015).

Some people buried some of their property with hopes to find it again after the war. Others gave their property to non-Japanese Canadian friends to care for until they returned. Others, as in the interview below, chose to throw away some of their family heirlooms rather than have looters or the RCMP take them.

“… the only thing that my mother vowed was that she did not want to give up the sword that had been in our family. Because we had come originally, way back, from a warlord family of samurai. And so, we had, you know, like armour and a sword that had always been on the wall. And she said there’s no way she was handing that in after all these generations. And so, although, Japanese people were not supposed to be out after dark, one night, my mother and our relatives that lived in North Vancouver, that were the boat makers, they came over and said “OK, we’re going to row out into the Straits.” Where all the big ships would come through. And she threw it overboard.”
(Jeanne Ikeda-Douglas, interview by Heather Read, for Landscapes of Injustice oral history interviews. August 13, 2015).

Discussion/written Reflection:

Have a discussion with students about why someone would rather throw away something important to their family versus having someone take it from them. Have students think about an object that is very important to their family and family history. How would they feel if a stranger or the government was going to legally get to take it? Would they rather throw it away so no one can have it? Even if it was legal to do so, do you think it was right for non-Japanese Canadians to take the homes and property of Japanese Canadians?

They planted vegetable gardens to help feed their families. They sewed and mended clothes. Japanese Canadians were only allowed to bring a limited amount of items, and so not many toys were brought. They fashioned toys out of wood and bigger items like sleds and skis were made for children. Japanese Canadians who were carpenters and boat builders used their skills to make furniture to help make their prisons feel more like a home.

Japanese Canadians banded together, pooled their money and supplies to improve their oppressive living conditions. For example, they worked to build buildings for communal use like building their own schools. Japanese Canadian children were not allowed to attend public schools. Family and community members took and shared photographs of family, friends, and social events. The artwork they created to express themselves now serves as reminders of their experience and helps to tell the story of incarceration.

Even while under guard, in the prison of war camp, in Angler, Ontario Japanese Canadians resisted by creating works of art. These PoWs, none of whom had committed any offence other than resisting the break-up of their families, were given limited supplies and were forbidden from revealing details about camp life. The art shown below was created by an unknown Japanese Canadian internee held in the camp:

Discussion/written reflection

How is making and building things, to create a more healthy and positive space out of a negative one, a form of resistance? Even if Japanese Canadians were able to make improvements to their living conditions, it does not mean they were happy to be living where they were; they were still incarcerated. Have students reflect on how Japanese Canadians must have felt to be living in captivity for years. Many children were born while their mother was incarcerated. How would that make you feel about being born into captivity? How would you feel about being Canadian? How would you feel about Canadian society? Do you think being proud to be Japanese Canadian is a form of resistance?

The Vancouver Asahi was a talented and popular Japanese Canadian baseball team that was disbanded due to the mass incarceration of Japanese Canadians during the Second World War, but former team members and veterans did not give up on baseball. Wherever they were incarcerated, they created baseball teams and even made baseball diamonds they could play on. It provided a positive physical outlet for the players and gave the Japanese Canadians something positive to take their attention away from their situation. The teams were well received and eventually allowed to go to other incarceration camps to play games against each other. (Source: Vancouver Asahi | The Canadian Encyclopedia)

Other sports were practiced by Japanese Canadians, including traditional ones like judo. Shigetaka (Steve) Sasaki is known as the father of judo in British Columbia. When he was incarcerated during the Second World War, he continued to teach judo classes. Even internees incarcerated in the Angler PoW camp continued to practice martial arts. You can learn more about him by going to Steve Sasaki – B.C. Sports Hall of Fame.

Discussion/written reflection

Why is playing sports good for your mental health, especially if you are incarcerated? What are the social aspects of going out to watch a game that could help people who are incarcerated? Discuss how sports can bring people together and be a needed distraction during difficult times.

Activity

Students can research the impact of the Asahi baseball team for the Japanese Canadian community. They could also research role models like Sasaki who helped continue Japanese Canadian culture during the Second World War.

Women’s auxiliary

Japanese Canadian women tried to make their poor living conditions as bearable as they could by working together and helping their neighbours. They did the best they could to be proud of being Japanese Canadian in a country that systematically worked at destroying their communities. Women’s auxiliaries, often connected to local churches, gathered to provide food or other items and supported events held at the church. These organized volunteer groups were critical to keep communities together and helped bring community feeling into the cold, desolate sites.

Kyowakai in New Denver

During the war, every camp had a kai or association that managed day-to-day survival. In 1943, the Kyowakai Society formed in New Denver, and until it disbanded in 2018 as elders died, it was the only wartime organization still in operation in Canada. Kyowakai means working together peacefully. The society’s purpose was social, cultural, religious, advocacy, and to be a nucleus for the Japanese Canadian community. (Source: New Denver Internment Memorial Centre).

Obon

Japanese Canadian culture is filled with festivals and events. The forced uprooting, incarceration, dispossession, and exile should have eradicated many, if not all, of these cultural events and celebrations. However, the opposite seems to be the case. Countless examples exist in the various incarceration sites where Japanese Canadians continued to honour and celebrate in traditional ways. Obon festivals (festival of the dead) continued at many sites, as well as theatrical productions that depicted Japanese Canadian ways of living.

Boy’s clubs

Both the federal government and BC provincial government refused to provide education services to incarcerated students. Eventually church organizations, and Japanese Canadian teachers put together education programs for elementary and secondary school students, but there was considerable free time for young boys and girls. Boy’s clubs, and even a famous scout troop, began to populate the landscape to help young boys expend energy and learn in purposeful ways.

Discussion/written reflection

Why is creating a sense of community a form of resistance? How did creating a sense of community help Japanese Canadians reaffirm their identity in a positive way?